Crafts & DIY
Learn how to paint beautiful dandelions by cutting slits into paper Starbucks cups
These turned out so beautiful and they're so easy to make.
Laura Shallcross
07.21.21

We’ve all seen a beautiful painting, photograph or sculpture and wanted to make it ourselves, putting our own twist on it.

You might have artistic talent without the creative brain that’s needed to think up brand-new, never-done-before ideas, and that’s fine. It’s actually very hard to think of something that hasn’t been done already nowadays.

That’s what makes this artist so special.

Jay Lee Painting is a YouTube artist with more than 3 million subscribers.

Located in Taiwan, Jay Lee is best known for his beautiful watercolor floral paintings, using calming shades of pale pink, green, purple, blue, and yellow.

Most of Jay Lee’s work is influenced by the nature around him, but when it comes to the processes used to create his paintings, he’s incredibly creative.

One of his most popular videos is a tutorial for painting dandelions with Starbucks cups.

It seems like such a simple hack that you’d never imagine this could look any better than a child’s attempt.

Jay Lee Painting/ YouTube
Source:
Jay Lee Painting/ YouTube

But when you watch the video, your mind will be blown by how beautiful the finished result is.

Let’s take a look at the steps to painting a dandelion with a Starbucks cup.

1. First, take your cup and cut about a quarter of the way down from the rim.

Jay Lee Painting/ YouTube
Source:
Jay Lee Painting/ YouTube

Repeat this over and over again until the whole outer edge of the cup looks frayed. There should be a space of around 1cm between each cut.

Don’t worry about this looking too even – Jay Lee doesn’t take any measurements. Going freehand is fine.

2. Next, fan out the frayed edges of the cup so that they form a circle around the rim.

Jay Lee Painting/ YouTube
Source:
Jay Lee Painting/ YouTube

Push the edges against your palm to flatten them at a right angle. You now have what you need to get started with the painting.

3. Take some white paint and spread it thickly onto a surface.

You can use a spare tub or anything similar. Just make sure it’s big enough to hold the white paint. Jay Lee uses a wooden clipboard.

4. Gently press the cup into the white paint.

Jay Lee Painting/ YouTube
Source:
Jay Lee Painting/ YouTube

Don’t spin it around, here – just dab it on several times. Then remove the cup and lay a piece of black paper on a flat surface.

5. Press the cup on the paper where you want your dandelion to be.

Jay Lee Painting/ YouTube
Source:
Jay Lee Painting/ YouTube

You can lift and press while rotating the cup to give a more textured effect – just don’t smear the paint around unless that’s the look you’re going for.

Repeat this process for a second flower.

6. After this, all that’s left is to finish the painting.

Jay Lee Painting/ YouTube
Source:
Jay Lee Painting/ YouTube

Jay lee paints a stem for each flower, then gets to work on the details.

He uses a variety of tools, including cotton buds, to create the puffy dandelion texture and give the appearance that the seeds are starting to blow away with the wind.

The end result is simply beautiful.

See the full tutorial and how gorgeous this painting turned out to be in the video below!

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